When a person goes through a high-asset divorce, there are always adjustments that will need to be made—both personally and financially. This can be particularly true if one spouse was the primary or sole breadwinner in the family and the majority of the couple's income came from that spouse's earnings.

Traditionally, it is the wife who may be hardest hit financially after a high-asset divorce. Statistics from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reveal that women only earn 77 cents to every dollar that is earned by men. After divorce, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, a woman's income decreases by almost 40 percent. This can exacerbate an already stressful economic situation.

Women also traditionally have less money in their retirement accounts. Men, on average, have at least 60 percent more funds in their contributed funds than women do. This fact again stresses the need for a skilled legal negotiator during a high-asset divorce.

A common stipulation in high-asset divorces is alimony, also known as spousal maintenance. Alimony is money that one spouse is court-ordered to pay the other spouse. Unlike child support, alimony is completely up to a judge's discretion. In September 2011, Texas HB 901 amended the rules regarding alimony in this state, including increases to the amount and length of time a spouse may be entitled to spousal maintenance.

Traditionally, there are two ways alimony payments can be made in high-asset divorces—either periodic alimony (which is paid on an established schedule i.e. monthly) or in a lump-sum payment. There are benefits and disadvantages to each of these two methods, and an experienced complex litigation attorney can help determine which is best for your situation.

In periodic alimony payments, the payments are typically set for a certain period of time. Usually, alimony payments will end if:

According to National Endowment for Financial Education, one-third of people admit to financial infidelity in their marriage. Income, bank accounts, purchases, cash, and other financial information are just some of the items that may be hidden from a spouse. Not only can this have consequences on a marriage, it can also have a direct bearing on any complex divorce settlements should the couple's marriage end.

There are several ways people can hide income and assets from a spouse in order to avoid including them in the marriage estate. A spouse who is going through a high asset divorce and suspects the other spouse has committed financial infidelity should consider the following:

• A spouses who are trying to hide money will transfer funds into a separate account that has just his or her name on it;

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A Texas judge recently ruled that the state's same-sex marriage ban is unconstitutional. In February, a federal judge made the same ruling in a different case, striking down the state's marriage ban law.

The state case involves a couple who were married in Washington D.C. in 2010. One of the women became pregnant via artificial insemination. The baby was born in February 2013. Shortly after that, the couple split up and the biological mother sought to retain sole custody of the baby since the other woman is neither a biological or adoptive parent to the child. However, since Texas does not recognize same-sex marriages, there is no legal process in place to divorce.

According to law, children who are born in a marriage are considered a child of both spouses. This parental presumption also holds true in states that recognize same-sex marriages. In states that do not recognize same-sex marriages, like Texas, then the law says the parent who gave birth is the child's only parent.

Many couples on the brink of divorce will try marriage counseling as a last ditch effort to save the marriage. Quite often, one spouse wants to save the marriage (referred to as "leaning in") while the other spouse really wants out of the marriage (referred to as "leaning out"). The leaning out partner goes along with the marriage counseling but really does not try to work through their issues. Instead, the spouse points out that marriage counseling is not working and proceeds to file for a divorce.

However, a different type of marriage counseling has been developed by professors at the University of Minnesota and is being used in their Couples on the Brink Project. It is called "discernment counseling" and the goal is to help couples decide whether or not they should proceed with the divorce, try to save the marriage, or just separate for a while and then come back to decide. This is short-term counseling and not meant to replace traditional marriage counseling.

One of the benefits of discernment counseling is that it brings the topic of divorce to the forefront of discussion. Frequently in troubled marriages, one or both of the spouses have been seriously considering divorce, yet have not articulated that to their partner.